Cardone 17-1833 Front Brake Caliper-reman Bolt-on Ready Caliper W/pads on 2040-parts.com

Concept Car of the Week: Alfa Romeo BAT 7

This week sees the Concept of the Week title go to Alfa Romeo and Bertone for their collaboration on the Alfa Romeo BAT 7, the second addition to the BAT series that began in 1953 and finished in 1955. First seen at the 1954 Turin motor show, this wildly futuristic ‘dream' car came about after Alfa Romeo contacted Giuseppe "Nuccio" Bertone of the Bertone carrozeria to commission three concepts with the lowest possible drag coefficient. The cars were named BAT for "Berlinetta Aerodinamica Tecnica." Built upon the Alfa Romeo 1900 chassis, the BAT cars featured large rear bumpers and curved fins, and the concepts achieved a drag coefficient of just 0.19 - an impressive result.

BMW Megacity Vehicle (MCV)

BMW's Project i – an internal codename for a possible sub-brand dedicated to green urban driving – has been in the works for some time. The Vision EfficientDynamics concept, unveiled at the 2009 Frankfurt Show, showcased some of the lightweight technological advances and design thinking behind the forthcoming zero-emission cars. Recently the firm held a Project i event, where it released teaser sketches of the first vehicle to result from the project, the Megacity Vehicle (MCV) – a four-seater electric car with a rear-mounted engine and rear wheel drive.

MINI: Meet the MINI Family Video

MINI sends us a 2011 family video Many moan that MINI has become a parody under BMW, but the truth is that it’s just become an enormous success with BMW doing what BL tried to do a generation ago – and failed. BL failed to grow and develop the Mini beyond the 1960s, although it had success in the ’60s with badge-engineered Minis (Riley Elf, Wolsely Hornet), Mini Coopers and Countrymans, and even a grown-up Mini – the Austin/Morris 1100. So BMW are really only carrying on what BL did in the ’60s, just in spades.